CRISIS
Who are Literate People?
The people who think that Delhi is one of the most polluted cities in the world are called literate people.
There are very few who believe this fact.
This is called true Crisis.
The high levels of deadly particles in Delhi's air probably make it the worst in the world. Mexico City looks like a kitten in front of Delhi. All this is relatively well known because the World Health Organization monitors air pollution in some 20 metropolises of the world and Delhi indeed comes out pretty bad in this sample of cities. The Indian media has also publicised this fact. But what is not well known is that when Delhi's air pollution is compared with the air pollution in other Indian cities, this capitally polluted city appears quite clean. The Central Pollution Control Board has just released data on air pollution levels recorded in 90 cities in 1997. This data shows that Shillong is the only town that has clean air round the year.
Should all this be surprising? Not at all. Within just 15 years of what economists call the post-Second World War economic boom (1945-1960), a period during which the Western world created unprecedented material wealth, literally every Western city from Tokyo to London and Los Angeles began to gasp for clean air and every Western river from the Rhine to the Thames had become a sewer, much like our Yamuna. And Japan was reeling under unknown and crippling neurological disorders like the frightening Minamata disease. The same is happening in India today and, in fact, all across Asia. The growing pollution in the West led to a powerful environmental movement that then forced Western politicians to take the matter seriously. They did two things. During the 1970s and 1980s, these countries poured in enormous sums of money to control pollution.
According to one estimate, nearly 25 per cent of the industrial investment in Japan in the post-70s period went towards pollution control. And the governments strictly enforced their pollution control laws. As a result, the air and water had become a lot cleaner by the late 1980s and early 1990s, that is, in a period of about 20 years or one generation. The battle is, however, still not won. The West still has to find ways to deal with carbon dioxide pollution of the atmosphere, disposal of hazardous industrial waste (which often gets shipped to developing countries), growing groundwater pollution and disruption of the nitrogen cycle because of largescale use of fertilisers and manure, among a number of other vexing problems. The question that we need to ask ourselves is whether we will be able to see a turnaround in India in the next 20 years?
It is extremely doubtful that this will be the case. India's economy is just beginning to grow. Industrial development, agricultural modernisation and urbanisation - all of which pump poison into the environment - are still at a nascent stage. We still have a long way to go. Therefore, we can see enormous quantities of poisons being produced in the decades to come. And on top of all this, at the turn of the century, India does not have the wherewithal to emulate the West of the 1970s. Firstly, India's current per capita income is still not even a fraction of Western per capita incomes of the 1970s.
As a result, India will remain heavily constrained in investing in high quality, environmentally sound technology. India will continue to use low quality, highly-polluting technologies for a long time. Secondly, India's regulatory system is highly corrupt and incompetent in dealing with the new challenges arising out of pollution. And, finally, there is as yet no powerful popular movement against pollution, which can translate into votes and put the fear of God into our politicians.
Delhi has spent over 15 billion rupees (£183 m.) on cleaning the Yamuna in the years to 2006. Or, some 700 million rupees (£8.5 m.) per km in the 22-km stretch of the river as it passes through the city.
But in spite of this investment, the river Yamuna runs dirtier due to bribe and favour collection by DPCC officials.
The Yamuna has become dirtier, and so have the towns along its stretch. And Delhi is its biggest polluter.
The problem is that 11 of the city's 17 sewage-treatment plants are underutilized; a quarter of them run at less than 30 percent capacity. That's because the city's sewer system is so corroded and clogged it can't deliver to the treatment plants the waste of the 55 percent of New Delhi's 15 million inhabitants who are connected to the sewage system.
Delhi, with only 5 per cent of the nation's urban population, has 40 per cent of India's sewage treatment capacity, but remains as dirty as ever. The river, in fact, is clean until it enters Delhi at Wazirabad. It leaves the city transformed into a murky sewer.
In Delhi, the river has virtually no freshwater for nine months. Delhi impounds all its water at Wazirabad, where the dammed up river practically ceases to exist; what flows subsequently is only sewage and waste from Delhi's 22 drains. There is just no water available to dilute this waste.
Pollution levels in the Yamuna have risen 3.5 times between 1980 and 2007. BOD (biochemical oxygen demand) load has increased 3.5 times between 1980 and 2007 - from 117 tonnes per day in 1980 to 486 tonnes in 2007.
Measures of dissolved oxygen - used to check if the river is alive - in the relatively clean upper segments are falling, indicating an increase in organic pollution. By the time the river is midway through Delhi, the total coliform count is so high that it is difficult to count the zeroes. Pesticides and heavy metals are also present in the river.
In fact, the river does not meet minimum standards for bathing even after treatment. There has been no change in pollution levels in Delhi since 1996. On April 10, 2001, the Supreme Court directed that oxygen levels were to be maintained at a minimum concentration of 4 mg/l - but seven years later, the river is still dead.
It is clear that all the money spent to clean the Yamuna has literally flown down the drain because DPCC officials collect bribe from polluting industries.